Correct, before 2011ish, you were charged for SENT and RECEIVIED messages. They often had "plans" where you would get 100sms/month or 250 sms/month, or a-la-car

Correct, before 2011ish, you were charged for SENT and RECEIVIED messages. They often had "plans" where you would get 100sms/month or 250 sms/month, or a-la-carte. If you got an SMS spam, that counted to your allotment. SMS was so expensive compared to GChat/YahooMessenger/ICQ/etc that I didnt use it. But then you were on the "a-la-carte" plan of 10 or 25cents per message depending on your provider. Godforbid you sent an international SMS, those were 50cents a message and MMS (SMS with image) was 5o to 75 cents per message. My provider had no apparent way to not have the service, so you were essentially bullied into paying a-la-carte or bullied into a plan. Friends would get angry at each other for sending a message, or breaking a sentence into two messages. Again, I think it is INSANE that half the US legislature is trying to fault WhatsApp (100% no dollar cost) for being a "monopoly" given the situation that was fixed. https://judiciary.house.gov/uploadedfiles/competition_in_digital_markets.pdf?utm_campaign=4493-519 https://judiciary.house.gov/uploadedfiles/competition_in_dig...